Farmers feed their animals based on their traditional knowledge and information passed through generations with crop residues, locally available one or two feed ingredients like brans, oil-cakes, chunnies, grains etc. and seasonally available green fodders. They rarely offer mineral mixture to their animals or in a very less quantity of 25g to 50g per day. In most of the cases, the quantity of feed/fodder offered to animals is either more or less than the requirements. This leads to an imbalance of protein, energy and minerals in their ration. Animals on such imbalanced ration produce milk sub-optimally, cost of milk production is higher and it affects the health and fertility of animals. Therefore, it is necessary to educate farmers on feeding of balanced ration
Benefits of Ration Balancing Program
- Proper use of locally available feed resources at possible least cost
- Increases milk production with more fat and SNF
- Increase in net daily income
- Improves reproduction efficiency
- Reduces inter-calving period and increases productive life of animals
- Improves the general health of animals
- Improves the growth rate in growing calves, leading to early maturity
